What We Find (13 page)

“Crap,” she said, getting misty-eyed. Her nose immediately plugged up. “Can’t you leave in a few days? Give a girl a little time to get used to the idea?”

“This is better, honey. I told you from the day we met—I want to do this. I need to get out on the trail alone, just me and the inside of my head.”

“You’re leaving your truck in Leadville so you won’t have to come back here to get it in case you decide you’re done with this place. With me.”

“Not true. I will come back, I will see you again, but I don’t want you hanging on to a piece of me with expectations. I don’t want you looking at the truck and being reminded every day. I want you to be free to get on with your life. If you go back to Denver, I can find you there.”

“What in the world do you have to think about?” she demanded. “You’re almost the most normal man I’ve ever known! You are not even slightly fucked-up! There’s nothing you can’t think about right here. In fact, I’ll promise not to talk to you for three months so you can work through whatever it is and then we can work out anything else...” She stopped herself. “I’m close to begging,” she said. “I’m not going to do that.”

“You know how you said you had a pileup in Denver? Everything crashed down on you at once? Well, I went through a rough patch myself. Not something I’m ready to talk about just yet. Maybe someday. That’s why I need some time alone. Alone against the challenge of the hike over the mountains and through some wild country. Alone with no one in sight, where I have to rely on myself. Sometimes that’s what it takes. You know, you get a little tired, depleted, deprived, you have to push yourself, then things start to fall into place. I’m counting on that. I promise I’ll get in touch when I’ve had all I can take of the trail. Okay?”

“Whatever,” she said. She tried to hide the fact that tears were leaking out of her eyes. For just a second she thought,
I can tell him I’m coming up on a trial! That I need him! That I need the support!
But she couldn’t.

“Come here,” he said. “Close to me. We’ll hold on to each other. It’s hard for me to leave, you know. But I should do this even if it’s hard. I have to look around the inside of my head and sort things out. You only
think
I’m the most normal guy in town—I have a gnarly mess in there. Now come on, kiss me. You’re like buried treasure, you know that? I hobbled into this camp with no idea I’d have you for a while. Maggie, Maggie, you’re so wonderful...”

* * *

Just after dawn, Cal got dressed and ready to get in his truck and on the road. Maggie pulled on her clothes and joined him outside beside the truck.

“You’ll be okay, Maggie. You’re strong and you have good sense. Don’t get talked into anything—do what feels right.”

“You shouldn’t say that. What feels right is following you.”

“You wouldn’t like it.”

“I’m a great, experienced hiker!”

“No, you wouldn’t like watching me think. It’s like watching paint dry.”

“You’re a miserable tease,” she said. “I don’t even know your real name!”

He grinned. “I loved you trying to guess, though. It was fun hearing what you’d come up with next. You’re very creative.” He sighed. “It’s California. I’m California Cesar Jones.”

She was struck silent for a moment. “You have got to be kidding!”

“I wouldn’t kid about that. It’s on my driver’s license and everything. But don’t make me go through all that now. Just please kiss me goodbye.”

“You promise you’ll get in touch when this pilgrimage is over?”

“Yes, I promise. Thank you for everything you did for me.”

She kissed him deeply, held him tightly, damned fate for this. Just when she started to feel she was with a man who could carry his weight, he confessed that he was nuts and had to work on his issues by trotting over the mountains. Boy, could she pick ’em. Whatever saint was in charge of her love life was terrible at it.

He slapped her on the ass. “Take care of Sully. Take care of you.”

“Be careful,” she said.

“You bet I will.”

He climbed in the truck and pulled away. He drove slowly down the dirt drive to the road and without even thinking she followed, walking along behind him.

Beau was barking and running to her as Cal pulled out of sight through the trees. She turned to see Sully approaching.

“Gone, is he?” Sully said.

She nodded. “Did you know he was going?”

“He said so a couple a times this week. That the weather was just about mild enough for him, that he’d planned it all along. And he thanked me several times for the hospitality and for letting him lend a hand. Damn fool thing to do—thank me. Might as well a thanked me for having a damn heart attack.”

“We’re never going to see him again, Dad,” she said. “And that’s a shame.”

Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.

—Henry David Thoreau

Chapter 8

On the fourth day out on the trail, west of Boulder and north of Vail in
the mountains, just north of Rocky Mountain National Park where the air was pristine and the sky a beautiful blue, where he could see for miles and great, magnificent mountains rose and fell all along the horizon, Cal set up his little tent and dug a trench around a small fire. It was the end of the day. The sun was descending behind the Rockies. “This looks like as good a place as any. What do you think?” he said, aloud.

Of course there was no answer.

It was two years and two months since Lynne Aimee Baxter Jones had taken her last breath. It was approximately the same time of day, but on the first of March it had been so cold and dark. They had talked about the end for a long time, for months.

In the beginning they’d been so happy, so oblivious to the things that could go wrong. Cal had started out by working in the public defender’s office, passed the bar and got a lot of great job offers. Then Lynne passed the bar, gathered a few like-minded friends, wrote grants and within a couple of years she was operating a storefront legal clinic for the underprivileged. She won an award from the city of Detroit and was appointed to a legal oversight committee by the governor, a watchdog team running herd on lawyers with intent to mislead and gouge an unsuspecting public, particularly those of low income.

Meanwhile, California Jones was becoming famous in his own right, a white knight in the criminal law community. He was actually becoming rich, kid lawyer that he was. Cal had some gifts that he’d acquired from his off-balance, crazy family. One was an incredible memory. His father had taught the kids how to memorize and since they rarely attended school, it became imperative. Otherwise, when they did have a chance to go to school, they’d be humiliated by how little they knew. Or, given what their mother taught them, they might know all the wrong things. Cal could recite almost the entire novel
To Kill a Mockingbird
. He grew up wanting to be Atticus Finch. While Lynne took great pride in accepting very little compensation, Cal was enjoying a terrific income for the first time in his life.

They married and bought a sprawling house in Grosse Pointe. Lynne thought it was so funny, Cal and his solid house, big enough for an army. “You just don’t know how much trouble a big house can be!” she lectured.

“That’s right,” he said. “And I want to know.”

They talked about the children they would have because they both wanted at least two. Cal still wasn’t sure if things would be better or worse if they’d gotten right on that and had a child or two. Like Atticus Finch, he’d be a solemn widower lawyer, bringing up his children alone, filling them with pride and accountability. But they hadn’t done it and now he was completely alone.

As soon as they started trying for a baby, the nightmare of scleroderma invaded their lives. The painful disease of the connective tissue presents as a hardness and inflexibility of the skin and, in Lynne’s case, internal organs. At first they were optimistic and researched the disease, hoping that she’d be one of the lucky ones and get twenty years or even a cure.

It was not to be. The disease worsened rapidly and she was admitted into a research program. Again, she was not one of the lucky ones. The disease progressed quickly and Lynne spent two years battling the pain and immobility, not to mention disfigurement of her face and arms. That’s when she asked him. “I know we’re on the same page here, Cal. If my kidneys shut down or my heart gives out, so be it. No resuscitation. But if it takes too long, please, don’t let me suffer in pain. I wouldn’t let you, I swear to God. It’s not like there’s any hope.”

He promised.

She fought hard for as long as she could and they both prepared for what they knew would happen. Ultimately she had said, “It’s time. Please. I love you so much but I can’t do this anymore.” And Cal slid the needle into her IV, injected the morphine slowly, then crawled onto the bed, took his beautiful wife in his arms, held her and told her how she meant everything to him, kissing the tears from her face as she passed into the next world.

He looked up into the rapidly darkening sky streaked with wispy clouds. “Do you still think it was a good idea, Lynne?” He wished he knew if, wherever she was, in whatever form or realm, she was still okay with her choice. That it hadn’t been even one hour too soon. Because there were so many days when he thought about what he would trade for another hour with her. He’d gladly have given ten years of his own life for one of hers.

As per her wishes, there was no funeral. There was a celebration of life, standing room only. There were poor people, rich people, common criminals mixed up with wealthy family and friends from back East. There were politicians, illegals, lawyers and well-known thugs—between Lynne and Cal, their clients had been of every stripe. The governor delivered a few words; doctors and nurses who had fallen in love with her during her illness were present. She was beloved to so many. She had been so courageous.

He reached into his backpack and pulled out a leather satchel. The mortuary had transferred her ashes from the urn for him because you don’t take an urn on a long hike. The pouch was soft and solid. He held it to his heart briefly. Then he poured the ashes in a little mound on the ground. The breeze stole a little off the top right away. He remembered her last wishes.

Here’s what I want from you, California Jones. I want to be cremated. No funeral, I hate funerals. If you have to have some kind of party, you go ahead, do whatever gets you through it. Then I want you to find a beautiful place and dump my ashes on the ground. Let the wind take me away, Cal. And then I want you to let go of me. The only way you can honor my memory is with your happiness.

* * *

Cal stayed for three days in the spot where he’d let go of Lynne’s ashes. Water was readily available from a nearby stream. He suspected he was sharing the water with open-range cattle and wildlife, but it was good, clear water and he had a great water filter. He drank it and washed in it and it was cold as bloody hell, shocking him into awareness. He spent his time ruminating on his life with Lynne and tried to come to terms with the hard parts, the end of her life. He spent the days and nights focused on her because he was going to have to leave it behind eventually. It wasn’t as though he’d forget her, but he hoped the time had finally come for moving on. The past two years had been so lonely. And he’d held on long enough.

He made a very difficult decision. He left the leather satchel on the ground where the now dissipated ashes had been. He didn’t want to carry it with her remembrance just a bit of dust inside. He might obsess on it, caress it. It was time. He thought of his promise to her. She wanted him to be happy.

He started walking north. He carried a couple of maps for the Colorado and Wyoming CDT and had highlighted water access, campsites, towns and sections of road. He walked for days and got so damn tired and dry.

But his mind felt free to wander and, unsurprisingly, he spent a lot of time thinking about his childhood and about his dad, Jed Jones. In fact, he worried about his parents a lot. Jed was so flaky and unbalanced, the range of possibilities with him was endless. He’d gotten a little steadier in the past several years, since he’d been on the farm in Iowa and wasn’t roaming, but Cal wouldn’t be surprised to hear his parents were suddenly off on a mission to save cheetahs in the Congo or... Or that his father had taken his own life. He’d attempted suicide a few times, though they were halfhearted attempts. He jumped off a bridge and broke a leg once, but it was a low bridge. He took a bunch of pills, but slept it off—it turned out he didn’t have enough for a deadly dose. He stabbed himself in the heart—missed.

In the way that the eldest child in a family with dysfunctional parents will shift into the parent role at a very early age, Cal had become the one in charge. He couldn’t say exactly when. Maybe it was when Sierra was born. He was about eight and remembered carrying her around, feeding her, changing her. His mother had usually been preoccupied with their father, making sure he was happy and as secure as possible, so Cal tended to look after the children
and
watch over his parents. His mother said Jed was a genius and needed a lot of room to think and of course, Cal believed it. He still believed it—Jed had an amazing mind and was charismatic. When he started talking, people couldn’t turn away. He’d lecture on everything from the solar system to the cure for cancer. Jed had studied law before marrying Marissa, Cal’s mother, and he remembered every word he’d ever read. Or so it seemed.

Cal always knew there was something wrong with his father but he had no idea what. Eccentric, they called him. When Cal was about thirteen he thought he had it figured out—he blamed it on the pot. Jed smoked daily. But it was another few years before he’d learn the truth—his father heard voices. They were back on the farm because Marissa’s father had fallen ill and she was an only child. It was a lucky break—they were stable for a while. Jed, who knew a lot about everything and had experience in farming from their days as migrant workers, had something to do and they were all warm and fed. And one night Marissa asked, “Where’s your father?”

Cal said, “I saw him by the barn, talking to himself again. I guess he’s running ideas.”

And out of the blue Marissa said, “He’s not talking to himself.”

Cal was seventeen and suddenly it was all so clear. Jed had secret friends. Their mother was completely devoted because she was busy trying to conceal his illness. His delusions conversed with him and gave him advice, not always good advice. He smoked a lot of dope to keep them quiet and Marissa watched over him like the keeper she was and made sure the drug use didn’t get out of hand. She supported him in not seeking medical intervention because the drugs doctors used would slow down his beautiful mind and he couldn’t bear it. He’d tried a couple of times, she said, and it was brutal. He became a zombie. But worse, he became depressed because he couldn’t think.

Things had been quiet in those quarters the past ten years or so. Cal’s grandfather had died a long time ago and then his grandmother, as old as the ages, had needed Jed and Marissa on the farm, so they stayed. Then Grandma passed. Cal and his siblings were raised and gone. Jed and Marissa had no other means of support. Sometimes Cal held his breath, ready for some harebrained idea that would have them off on an adventure, but so far so good. Cal, being the father to his father, could usually talk Jed out of things.
I think if we burn the fields instead of plow them, the ash will give essential nutrients to the soil and make next year’s crop richer.

No
, Cal said,
that only works on rice fields. It has the opposite effect on corn and wheat. Besides, you lease those fields to farmers.

But God, they were exhausting. So, unable to really help and refusing to be as codependent as Marissa was, Cal limited his contact with them. He visited about once a year and talked to them every two to four weeks. He’d like to just talk to his mother but she was attached to his father and there was no way to isolate her and pull her out of that mess, not even for a conversation. They were like conjoined twins.

Interestingly, Cal, his younger sister Sedona and younger brother, Dakota, all broke out of that craziness. With a vengeance! Sedona was a psychologist, married to a businessman, mother of two children, living a very stable, happy life. Dakota was an Army major, decorated for valor. He was so rigid and conservative it almost made Cal’s teeth ache to be around him.

But Sierra, the baby, was lost. She might be schizophrenic like her father but it was impossible to tell because of her drug use. She’d seemed all right into her twenties and was an excellent student, then it fell apart. Cal and Lynne had staged an intervention, explaining the situation with her father, and mother for that matter, and tried to get her help. But rather than finding the source of her pain in Jed Jones, Sierra found an ally. Apparently she understood about the wild notions and mysterious voices. Sierra was now on the farm with Mom and Dad, probably weaving, reading bizarre shit and toking it up with Dad in the afternoons. “Whatever works,” Marissa was known to say.

Living with, perhaps understanding how to function in such a family, had made careers for Cal and Sedona. They were the opposite of freewheeling, new-age, whack-a-doodle hippies. Maybe Dakota, too. It was almost counterintuitive—if the parents are hippies and revolutionaries, the kids end up moderate and conventional.

Cal kept hiking. Every third or fourth night he found a campground or little bit of a town where he could wash, eat a protein-heavy meal, drink a couple of beers, talk to people, resupply.

It was when his trail also became counterintuitive, when he had to hike south to hike north, that he realized how much he missed Maggie. They were a little bit alike. They were both struggling to move on from their dynamic but abandoned careers, both getting over difficult childhoods, both floundering a little as they reached for a lifestyle that brought peace and comfort. And they could both go back to where they’d been tomorrow, pick up the threads of their previous lives, and succeed in many ways. She could go back to Denver and step into the operating room and resume her role as a talented young neurosurgeon. He could go back to Grosse Pointe and his old firm would welcome him with open arms. But he didn’t think either of them would do that.

He’d been on the trail for fourteen days. He’d done what he came to do. He’d left Lynne in the wind on a beautiful mountain pass. He turned right then, in the middle of the trail, and began walking south.